


Starved

by LittleSweetCheeks



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Angst, Kidnapping, M/M, Slow Burn, Torture, serious injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-02
Updated: 2018-06-02
Packaged: 2019-05-17 06:55:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 14,362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14827526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleSweetCheeks/pseuds/LittleSweetCheeks
Summary: “Aunt Penny?”“Yes, Sweetie?”“Something’s wrong. I woke up and all the doors and windows are open, and I can’t find Dad.”





	1. Chapter 1

The case had started in the early hours of the morning on December first with a phone call Garcia would remember for the rest of her life.

She hadn’t been surprised to see Hotch’s home number flash on her phone in the darkness, occasionally he would be working late on cases at in his home office and would need something from her. But, she was very surprised, and then horrified, when instead of her boss on the other end of the line, it was twelve-year-old Jack. And he sounded terrified.

The weather had been unseasonably cold for the area in recent weeks, a fact that the California native grumbled about often, but it wasn’t the weather that made her go even colder when Jack started to speak.

“Aunt Penny?”

“Yes, Sweetie?”

“Something’s wrong. I woke up and all the doors and windows are open, and I can’t find Dad.”

“Are you sure he isn’t downstairs or in the garage or something?”

“I looked. His car’s gone too. Can you come over?”

“Sure, Hon. I’ll be right there.” She forced her voice to stay even, even though she was already starting to freak out. Hotch wouldn’t just wander off and leave his son, even at his age. And he really wouldn’t leave the house standing wide open. Without any further thought for her own safety, Garcia rushed to her car, still in pajamas, as she first dialed Rossi to wake him.

Dave grumbled as he answered the phone. “Where’s the fire, Garcia?”

“Jack called. Something’s wrong.” She filled him in on the call she’d received and followed Rossi’s instructions to the letter on what to do when she got to the house, since she would get there before anyone else. Rossi said he’d call the others and they would meet her there. When Garcia arrived, she simply brought Jack, who had been waiting for her by the front door, out to her car and locked the doors to wait for the rest of the team. The older man had forbidden her from stepping inside until they arrived.

When the team showed up, they glanced at the pair in the car, JJ and Emily momentarily stopping to reassure them that they would be getting answers, before heading in to search the house. With Jack huddled in her arms, Penelope watched as every light in the house was turned on, lighting up the darkness.

“Do you think something is wrong?” Jack asked once.

“I don’t know, Jack. But we’re all going to figure it out.” She placed a kiss to his hair.

==

Spencer pressed the gas pedal of his car even harder, not caring about posted speed limits. Rossi’s call had instantly roused him from a deep slumber with his words, Aaron’s gone. It echoed in Spencer’s mind on a nightmarish loop, ‘Aaron’s gone, Aaron’s gone…’ It was a moment when he cursed his memory.

In the next moment, that same memory flashed other moments in his mind’s eye. Those fleeting moments between he and his boss, the ones that made him wonder if, just maybe, something could have a chance to blossom between them. But now it might have just been a pipe dream, something that would never happen. The older man might never know…

‘Aaron’s gone…’

==

After what felt like too long, Morgan, Rossi, and JJ appeared in the yard, the men stopping by the steps while JJ came to the car to sit with Jack. Temporarily relieved of her duty as caretaker, Penelope rushed to the pair for answers.

Softly, Morgan explained that the whole house was in pristine condition, laundry done, dishes washed. The only things they could find missing were the unit chief’s go bag and, Dave suspected, clothes for at least a week. Reid had unlocked the safe and both of Aaron’s firearms plus his credentials and phone were inside. There wasn’t a single thing anywhere that indicated a struggle, they planned on asking Jack if there was anything else out of place, but as far as any of them could tell, there were no clues.

Hotch’s personal vehicle, a newer model Grand Cherokee, was gone from the garage, Jack’s soccer things that likely had been in the back were carefully stacked by the wall. To the team, on the surface anyway, it looked like their leader had simply gathered when he would need for a short time and walked away.

Unable to accept that, Garcia shook her head. “But he wouldn’t do that. He wouldn’t leave Jack like this and vanish.”

“Baby Girl.” Morgan sighed. “There’s no sign of a struggle. No evidence there was someone else in the house. And you know Hotch, he would have fought with everything he had.”

“Unless they threatened Jack.” She rebutted. “He’d never allow Jack to be hurt. If there was a person here, a dangerous person, then he would have done everything to not wake Jack or risk his safety. You know that.”

Dave nodded. “She has a point. Aaron would allow anything to happen to him if it meant protecting Jack.”

Morgan rubbed his head. “Yeah.” He turned and stared up at the house. “But how do we find him?”

“Did you check everywhere for a note?” Garcia pressed.

“Office, bedroom, Jack’s room. We’ll have a forensics team comb over the house, but so far nothing.”

“What about the cabinet in the kitchen?” Garcia inquired.

“The what?” Both men asked back.

“When I need to look after Jack, or if I need to stop by for something else, there’s a cabinet in the kitchen where he puts any information. Usually it’s updated doctors’ details, that sort of thing, but sometimes it’s other stuff.” When she saw they didn’t know what she was talking about, she rushed into the house and looked for herself, opening the cabinet in the kitchen above the stove, she found the note taped to the inside of a cabinet door addressed to her. Garcia’s heart nearly stopped for a second time as she stared at her boss’s familiar scrawl on the outside of the envelope. “Morgan!” She cried out, not wanting to be the one to touch it.

The team followed Morgan in and watched as he checked it out. “It’s addressed to you. Why?”

Dave’s eye twitched as he thought. “If this is an abduction and the person didn’t know the whole team well, maybe Hotch said she was just a sitter.” To Garcia he continued. “Open it.”

_Penelope-_

_I am sorry for leaving Jack unattended, please look after him for me. I can not talk about why I have left now, but hopefully you will be able to discover the reason soon. The answer will not be found in the obvious places as I had never known them before._

_Thank you for being good at what you do for me, Penelope, you are important, and you are the best at taking care of everyone._

Garcia looked up. “I don’t understand. This is…weird.” She handed Morgan the page.

Unsure how to proceed, Rossi suggested that they gather things for Jack and Reid and Emily would stay and wait for forensics before everyone would meet up at Garcia’s apartment to start brainstorming how to proceed. By sun-up, the team had agreed to follow the request of the cryptic sounding letter. Jack would stay in Garcia’s care and she was praying to everything she could think of that Hotch would come home to them safely.

==

The team, together as one, went to Cruz and then the FBI’s upper suits the following morning, and tried to convince them that Hotch had been abducted and was in danger, but after reading the letter and reviewing the details of how the house had been found, the FBI officially declared that Aaron Hotchner had simply crumbled under the weight of his responsibilities and had vanished voluntarily, leaving his son behind. There was talk of Jack needing to be turned over to child welfare, but Rossi convinced them that Garcia, as well as other members of the team, were already listed as the boy’s emergency caregivers and Aaron’s written request was that the perky blonde take the boy in. As they left the meeting, it was hard for any of the members of the team to wrap their head around anyone thinking that Hotch would pull a Gideon but would also abandon his son in a dark house.

It just didn’t add up.

Huddled later that day in the conference room, they swore together that they would find him and bring him home again.


	2. Chapter 2

December second started completely differently than the day before. For starters, Penelope woke to the process of caring for an almost teenage boy whose routine she wasn’t used to. After a breakfast discussion, she agreed to contact the school and let them know what was happening and that Jack just needed some time. He was upset and hurting, confused about what had happened to his father, his only parent, and he wasn’t up for sitting at a desk all day. Thankfully the school was understanding.

“C’mere, Sweetie.” She pulled him close. “Talk to me.”

Jack sagged into her arms. “I- Am I a horrible person if I wish my dad wasn’t an agent? Does that make me selfish?”

“No, Hon, it doesn’t.” She squeezed just a little tighter. “Most agents never see the things your dad sees. In fact, a lot of them rarely even have to fire their guns. Your dad though… He’d never send one of us to do something he wouldn’t do himself. And that makes him a great leader, but it also means he takes more hits than other guys sometimes.”

“I don’t like it.”

“Neither do I. You have your dad to worry about, but I sit in my office and I worry about everybody, you included. I worry when I can’t get ahold of someone or if I hear that someone is hurt.” She sighed. “I panic when anyone is in the hospital. I track everyone’s phone; did you know that?”

“Yeah.”

“I can track the Bureau vehicles as well.”

Jack stood straight. “Can you track my dad’s Jeep?”

“I’m going to try just as soon as we get to the office.”

==

Spencer hadn’t slept at all. He’d gone over and over everything they had and hadn’t found in the Hotchner home until he could recite it without hesitation. Granted, that didn’t actually take much.

He found himself more than once shedding tears for the feelings he might never get to share.

==

Once they arrived in the bullpen, Jack bounced from office to office, amusing himself and trying to stay out of the way while the rest of the team carefully began to pick apart every unsub who could have recently gotten free, every suspect they couldn’t arrest, anything, to figure out what had happened to their boss.

Emily dropped the most recent file. “The note said the answer will not be found in the usual places, that he had never known them before. Could Hotch have meant this person won’t be found in these files?”

JJ frowned. “Maybe?

“If the person isn’t in here, then where do we start?” Reid peered up. “There are just too many possibilities.”

Garcia’s head popped up from behind her laptop. “I found his Jeep, but it’s going to be a dead end. It’s in the lot of a closed gas station just off the highway.”

Rushing, the team hurried out of the room to check out the car, finding it under a tarp and wiped completely clean.

Cruz appeared after lunch and announced Morgan the Unit Chief and instructed the team to sort out Hotch’s former office. He hadn’t noticed Jack sitting in the room until the boy began to cry over hearing the words.

The entire team finally retired to the conference room to begin to assemble notes while Penelope pulled Jack into her office to watch movies while she began to set up traces and flags in case Hotch somehow tried to get a message to them.

==

The rest of the week went much the same. Garcia and Jack came to the office and he watched movies while she and the team worked to track down his dad and then at the end of the day, the pair headed back to her place to eat dinner and head to bed. She hated how sad Jack always looked but no matter what she tried, she couldn’t seem to perk him up even a tiny bit.

By Friday afternoon, Penelope was swinging back and forth in a chair in the conference room, staring at the note that had been left for her. Every time she read it, it felt…off. Like he was trying to tell them, her, something without being able to say it straight up. And while his handwriting on the envelope had been familiar, what had been written on the page within had looked odd as well. Almost like he’d been writing with his right hand.

She wondered if that was a message in and of itself, the handwriting. Everyone had read and re-read it though and not even Reid had come up with much of anything. She startled when Jack spoke from the doorway.

“Aunt Penny?”

“Yes, Sweetheart?” She turned her chair toward him. “Come, sit. It’s okay.”

“You guys really don’t think he just left me as went away like the other agents do, do you?”

“Oh, no Hon. There’s not a chance in the world he just walked away.” When he got close enough, she pulled him onto her lap, not caring that he might be too old. “Something happened, and he went away. Knowing your dad? I would guess that you were at risk because honestly? I can’t think of any other reason why he would leave you home alone like that.”

“If people have him, what will happen to him?”

“I don’t know that until we know who has him unfortunately.”

“Oh. Do you think they’ll kill him?”

Garcia couldn’t help the ache in her heart at the worry in Jack’s voice. “I can’t answer that.”

Jack nodded. “I think Monday I’d like to go back to school.”

“If that’s what you want, we’ll do that.”

He nodded and stood, leaving her in the room alone.


	3. Chapter 3

Two more weeks passed with no sign of Hotch anywhere. Spencer kept going over the letter and had returned to Hotch’s house three more times searching for clues but had come up emptyhanded every time.

Penelope had broken into Hotch’s phone and emails. The location on his phone had been no good since it’d been left behind, but she combed through texts, calls, and emails both present and deleted. There had been a few cryptic messages she hadn’t been able to source so far, and she had been surprised to find some old texts from the past summer from a woman that apparently Hotch had been seeing. By the sound of the messages the relationship had ended amicably, and they still talked from time to time.

She made a mental note to mention it to Rossi and see if it was an avenue worth investigating.

Penelope wasn’t looking forward to going home again to the sight of Jack who seemed to be growing more depressed by the day over the idea of potentially being an orphan. Every day it broke her heart a little more.

==

December twenty-second changed that.

Garcia rushed into her office early in the morning, just as she had done every morning since that god-awful day, and immediately checked her computers for any results of her searches. She had alerts on Hotch’s bank accounts, his social security number, his passport, and anything related to his name nationwide. If anyone so much as googled his name, she’d find out about it. Garcia had also set up her usual alerts for the team’s code phrase, a phrase set up in case one of them was ever in trouble and needed to get help. But every morning had been the same, no signals letting them know Hotch’s location, no fingerprints popping up from a morgue, and she was supremely thankful for that.

Every morning until this one, that was. She sank into her chair as the computers booted up and was nearly speechless with surprise when her system instantly began to flash and beep.

An ad had been run in an online newspaper. The ad itself looked like confused ramblings that most people would ignore, but to Penelope, it might as well have been a sign from the heavens. Rushing out of her office, she ran as fast as her towering heels would let her through the building until she found Rossi just getting settled in his office. “The movie was eviler twin!”

“What?” His head snapped up, eyes focused on her.

She was grinning so wide that her cheeks hurt. “The movie was eviler twin!”

“Where?” Dave lurched out of his seat to follower her. “Are you sure?”

“It’s a small online local paper somewhere.” They both started jogging back to her office. “It set off my alarms this morning.” Back in her office, she set to work. “It’s a small-town paper in Maine.” She pulled up a map. “North of the state park.” She tapped and brought up the whole page, so they could read the simple ad in its entirety. _The movie was eviler twin. 73642864_

Dave’s eyes tracked over it again and again. “Print this out, make copies. The rest of the team should be here any minute, we’ll all go over it together.”

“Should we try to call the number?”

“Not yet.” Once he had a hard copy in his hand, he frowned. “I’m not sure but I don’t think this is a phone number. There’s too many digits.”

“A location?”

“Not enough digits. Let’s get this in front of Reid.”

“Okay.”

As soon as Dave had shared the news, the whole team had descended on the single clue and began to try and work it out. Garcia apologized more than once that the location was simply too broad for her to get a better idea of who might have taken Hotch or to where.

Spencer had been standing at the white board for an hour, silently doing what he did best, when he started to add letters beneath each number. The rest of the team watched as he then began to erase letters is seemingly random patterns.

“What is it?” Emily finally asked.

“I don’t think it has anything to do with numbers at all.” He finally stepped back. “Look.”

JJ shook her head. “It’s a bunch of letters now instead of numbers.”

“No.” Spencer rewrote the letters in the opposite order as they all gasped. “It literally says Hotchner.” He turned to Garcia. “Can you see if there are any other ads with numbers that don’t make sense?”

“Yeah, sure.” She began to type away, pulling up the whole paper. “There’s an odd one in the personals. WWM4M/F.”

Dave’s brows pulled together. “What?”

Garcia smirked. “Widowed white male for male or female.”

“Kinky.” Morgan commented with a chuckle.

“Well, that’s all the letters, the rest are numbers and it’s definitely not a phone number either.” She brought it up on the screen and Spencer instantly began to write them on the board.

“Assuming the first one is a cipher of sorts, that means these numbers match to the same series of letters and it should only take a minute to work out the words.” Everyone silently watched as he crossed things out and circled letters until he had the best guess as to the message. “Tom Jones. Twenty ac, cabin off grid.” He turned. “I’m guessing this part means twenty acres.”

“Tom Jones could be a fake name.” Morgan pointed out.

“But it’s all we’ve got to go on.” Dave answered. “Garcia? We need the closest point you can get us to the area this paper covers and the all large pieces of property in the area. Finding a cabin that’s off the grid won’t be easy, but once we’re up there, someone might know something.”

==

It turned out that the local online news page had a very real store front, or perhaps counter front, inside a small convenience store. Morgan put on the charm with the middle-aged woman there as he showed her his badge, and she was more than happy to describe the thin, quiet man who’d placed both ads. She’d seen him around for a week or so, always with another man, though it had been the first time she’d ever seen him on his own.

“I think they live somewhere outside town.” She leaned in close to Morgan. “He seemed painfully shy and never talked and I couldn’t work out why, such a handsome man as him. Too thin, even under all those sweaters, and he had a hard time keeping focused.”

“A hard time?”

“Maybe a stroke or something? His mouth didn’t seem to work normal. He’d seem really determined to focus on getting something through, but halfway would kind of drift out. Yesterday, the man who usually cares for him had stepped next door to the bank. They’d had a talk out on the sidewalk and he’d been left on his own to wander a bit, I guess the other man figured he wouldn’t wander too far. It’s been so cold, the man you’re asking about came in here. The messages he asked to post were just gibberish, he didn’t have any money and he seemed to get upset when I tried to refuse him. I didn’t know if his caretaker knew he was doing it, but I figured it wouldn’t hurt anything. And it wasn’t a lot of money, so I figured if it wasn’t a problem.” She frowned now. “Why, exactly, if the FBI looking for him? I can’t imagine that man being involved in anything.”

“Did he say anything else other than to place the ads?”

“Say? Oh, no. He didn’t talk at all, he had a note to place the ad. He clearly could understand me, so he wasn’t deaf or anything, but he never talked. His face was a bit…off, you understand? Anytime he answered a question I had, he wrote it down. The ads were all written out too on a bit of paper.”

“I don’t suppose he left the paper behind?” Morgan was hopeful.

“You know, he did.” The woman crossed the room and picked up a small sheet of paper off the desk in the corner. “Here you go.”

“Thank you, ma’am.” He looked down at his boss’s tight script. “I don’t suppose you have any cameras?”

She laughed. “No, darling. Not me. The bank does though next door and the coffee shop over the road.”

“Thank you.” Derek headed back to where the rest of the team had gathered. “Her description doesn’t sound much like him unless he’s been tortured, but this is a damn good clue.” He held up the paper. “She described him as very thin and having trouble concentrating. She also said he didn’t or couldn’t talk due to some deformity or injury.”

JJ gasped slightly. “Did she have cameras?”

“No, but the bank and café do.”

“Then let’s check there next.” Rossi instructed. “Our unsub could have taken measures to make it so Hotch was in no condition to fight back. Morgan, you and JJ head to the bank, the rest of us will cover the coffee shop and then we’ll go from there.”

==

JJ took the lead in the bank where they got access to the security footage, luckily the front cameras also saw through the windows onto the sidewalk at the front and the pair watched a burly looking man leading what looked suspiciously like their boss along. “Does this man have an account?”

The bank manager studied the picture. “I don’t see him often, but he has an account under the name Tom Jones. His address is out somewhere in the woods. He’s one of those doomsday prepper types. A few weeks ago, a cousin of his was released from a hospital type care place due to budget cuts and now Tom’s caring for him.”

“His cousin?” Morgan asked. “He called him that?”

The banker nodded. “Said the guy had been kept in some sort of home all his life, wasn’t firing on all cylinders, ya know? He told us that when he’d medicated, he’s not violent, but that he was delusional and constantly believed he was other people.”

Frowning, JJ turned to Morgan. “So even if Hotch could talk, no one would believe his or even look into it and warning everyone that he ‘isn’t violent when medicated’ explains being doped into submission and keeps people at arm’s length.”

He nodded. “And if Hotch did snap, people wouldn’t think too much of it.”

“Who?” The banker looked between them. “Tom said his cousin’s name was Eric.”

Thumbing through her phone, JJ pulled up a picture of Hotch and showed the man.

“Wow, he looks so different there, but that’s definitely Eric.”

“His name’s not Eric, It’s Aaron. Hotchner. He’s an FBI agent who was abducted from his home three weeks ago.”

The man looked appropriately horrified. “What can I do to help?”

“Give us everything you have on Tom Jones.”

==

Not wanting to raise suspicions by staying in such a small town, the team headed to the next town over to have lunch and regroup. Dave took the lead on assembling the information. “We need to assume that Aaron is going to need significant medical attention when we get to him. The description in the coffee shop backed up the ones from the other two places that Aaron has had something happen to him, possibly his jaw, maybe a head injury. They described him as compliant, quiet.”

“How could it have gotten to this so fast?” Emily had to ask. “This camera footage and the description, could this really be from extended torture?”

Reid spoke up. “If he was drugged so he couldn’t fight back, and then if he wasn’t given any food or water at all, his body would begin using up his reserves fairly fast. Starvation also leads to decreased mental capacity and then if he was beaten or tortured…” He trailed off. “Yes, it’s possible for him to get to this stage in only a few weeks.” He wouldn’t allow himself to think of what other atrocities Hotch might have endured.

“So, do we just rush out and get him?” Morgan asked.

“We need to do surveillance. We need to see how much cover this place has, touch base with the locals and have back-up. The house could be booby-trapped, we don’t know.”

JJ pulled out her phone. “I’ll reach out to the locals if someone can get Garcia up to speed?” She waited for a nod before stepping away.


	4. Chapter 4

They sat on the small cabin for the entire afternoon, watching as Jones came and went without any sight of Hotch. Just after sunset, their suspect stepped out of the cabin again and this time went around the small building and down into a cellar. Ten minutes of silence passed before Jones reappeared, this time dragging Hotch behind him despite the bitter cold. Everyone remained quiet as Hotch was led, on his hands and knees, to a metal T in the middle of the yard that looked like an old clothesline post and was chained up to it. Jones spoke before turning and heading back inside the cabin.

After a few minutes of being very still, Hotch crawled to the end of the chain attached to the collar he was wearing to where two small bowls sat on a cement paver. Slowly, he lifted one and then the other to his lips, eating and drinking what was in them carefully before moving closer to the post again so the chain was loose and curling up to protect himself from the cold.

“We need to go to him.” Reid whispered.

“No. We wait.” Rossi whispered back. “We need more information.” They all turned back and watched their friend shiver against the cold as darkness set in. Finally, Rossi spoke again. “One at a time, we _carefully_ move in. We need to split up, cover all sides of the cabin, all doors and windows, we don’t want any surprises. I know we all want to rush to Hotch, but if this is how he’s been kept for this whole time, we don’t want to overwhelm him.” He looked around at the team. “Morgan and I will be the only ones to go to him for now.” He raised his hands when some started to object. “We want to grab and run and from the looks of him, I’m not sure how well he can manage under his own power.”

==

Aaron huddled close to the ground and waited. He knew the routine now, Tom would leave him outside to eat and do his business like a dog, shivering in the cold. Soon enough, the cabin lights would turn off and the man would step out one last time, unhooking him from the post and locking him back in the cellar. He was never given enough food to have the strength to fight back.

Glancing out into the dark woods, Aaron let the hallucinations set in again as they did every night. Some nights he would see Jack, other nights it would be members of his team, especially Reid, but eventually they all faded. Tonight, he saw Dave and Morgan creeping toward him, but he didn’t react, reacting to his hallucinations meant more beatings, so he simply laid limp on the ground as the pair closed in. When he felt the memory of hands on him, his eyes slipped shut.

==

JJ rushed across the yard from where the locals had handcuffed Jones with a set of keys in her hand to set Hotch free and handed them over before stepping back, watching as Morgan and Rossi lifted the limp body of their friend and start to carry him out of his nightmare.

Emily and Reid eventually emerged out of the cellar with matched frowns on their faces, joining the rest of the group as they watched the ambulance drive away. “On a positive note.” Emily finally spoke once it was gone. “I don’t believe Jones is a sexual sadist. Nothing in the cellar gives any impression of that.”

==

Aaron blinked and tried to look around the room. He wasn’t in the cellar, that was for sure, but he wasn’t sure how he got to the hospital. Inhaling, he smelled the sterile oxygen being gently blown into his nose, his nose twitching at the feel of another tube going up. Lifting his hands, he felt the tug of IV tubes on either side. Exhausted and still confused, he let his eyes fall shut again as his mind worked out possible scenarios. Maybe he passed out for good and Jones had been forced to bring him in? No, the man didn’t seem to care whether he lived or died. Maybe someone, a neighbor perhaps, found him? But then would Jones be looking for him?

A nurse quietly entering the room made his eyes flutter open again.

“Oh, hello.” She smiled softly. “My name is Bernice. Do you know where you are?”

Aaron frowned, he tried to open his mouth, something he hadn’t been able to do properly in weeks at least, but this time there was even more resistance. A pencil appeared in his line of sight and he looked up to see Bernice was holding a pad of paper. Slowly with his left hand, he scrawled- _hospital._

“Do you know where?”

_No._

Bernice nodded. “Can you tell me your name?”

Slowly he wrote. _Where’s Tom Jones?_

She seemed to understand his worry. “Someone else had you brought in by ambulance.” She pulled a photo out of her clipboard and checked the back before holding it up. “Can you tell me who this is?”

The photo, clearly the kind the hospital took for security ID’s, made Aaron give his best attempt at a smile. _Dave._ Below that, he wrote more easily- _I am FBI agent Aaron Hotchner._

That brought a bigger smile to her face. “Agent Rossi said to tell you Merry Christmas.” She caught the look of surprise on his face. “Today is Christmas, what’s left of it anyway. He said you’ve been missing since the first.” She began her checks of her patient. “You’ve been in the hospital three days and you’re going to be here a while longer.”

He tried to huff through his almost closed teeth. The team had found him! And if the team had found him, that meant Spencer was there too, it would have been Spencer who’d worked out his code. The beep of the monitor by his head announced to them both his increased heartrate at the thought of getting to see Spencer again and he was suddenly thankful he couldn’t talk yet.

Bernice seemed to understand. “The surgeons had to rebreak and wire your jaw. You are currently being treated for exposure, very severe malnutrition, as well as for a few small infections.” Once done recording his vitals, she took a seat beside his bed. “I have a few other things I was told to tell you.” She met his eye. “The agents who waited here while you were in surgery, they said they’ve told Jack they found you, he’s okay and…” She glanced at her clipboard again. “And a Penelope has been looking after him… Is Jack your son?”

Aaron nodded. He wondered how long his son had been alone in the house before he’d woke to find his dad gone and had called for help. Shutting his eyes, he flashed back to that night.

==

_He’d just checked on Jack, again, and was making his rounds of the house to be sure everything was locked up. Aaron was dressed in pajamas, it was late, nearly midnight already and he was exhausted. Movement on the front lawn made Hotch freeze in his dark living room. The man was big, he had never seen him before but a minute later his massive shadow blocked the moonlight filtering through the glass of the door. Wishing he could grab his gun first, Aaron pulled the door open. “May I help you?”_

_The man pushed his way in before turning and swinging hard, landing a heavy blow to the side of his head. “You’re coming with me or I go upstairs and I get your precious little boy instead.”_

_“No!” He gasped. “Just… I’ll do anything, just don’t touch Jack.”_

_“Jack. What a sweet name.” The man grabbed Hotch by the throat, hauling him to his feet. Pulling a gun out of his waistband, he pointed it against Hotch’s chest. “You do what I say, and Jack doesn’t wake up hearing daddy die.”_

_“Okay.” His eyes tracked around the room, hoping to find his phone, but failing._

_“First, we’re going to collect anything that could identify you as a Fed and we’re gonna put it away, then you’re going to get your things and we’re going for a drive.” It horrified Hotch that the man dragged him directly to his home office where he was directed via gun muzzle to grab his badge and gun and shut them in the safe. “You gotta bag you can pack?”_

_“Yeah, up in my room.” Hotch knew it would take them right past Jack’s room. “If you want to get me out without my son knowing, we need to open the windows some, he sleeps better when it’s cold. If he gets hot, he’ll wake up.” Aaron lied._

_The burly man hesitated only a moment, debating before nodding. “We can open whatever we pass.”_

_Hotch nodded. Once in his bedroom, he began to load his go bag, spotting his notepad in the bottom. When his abductor stepped into the hall a moment, Aaron quickly scrawled out a note and shoved it into the pocket of his pajamas. “I need to leave a note downstairs, in the kitchen, then you can do with me what you want. So long as you never hurt Jack.”_

_The man stepped back into the room with a nasty grin on his face. “Good to hear.” Taking another long stride, he punched Hotch again, sprawling him out onto the carpet. “Let’s go.”_

_In the kitchen, Aaron reluctantly let the man review the note before tucking it away and being escorted to his own vehicle. They emptied Jack’s things and the man finally bound Aaron’s ankles and wrists before shoving him in the back._

_“Don’t get too comfortable in here, we’ll be switching up soon enough.” With that, he slammed the door shut, making Hotch focus on only how much his head was pounding._

==

Aaron blinked his eyes open again and looked around, Bernice was watching him carefully. Lifting the pencil, he tried to ask her another question. _Did they catch him?_

The nurse leaned forward. “I think so.”

_Where is my team now?_

“They all flew home last night for Christmas. One of the younger agents was talking about a meeting, but I think the others, at least some of them, are coming back up here tomorrow.”

_Up here?_ Spencer had been here but had left, Aaron wondered if he would be one of the ones to return.

“We’re in Maine.” She watched him consider that a minute. “You really didn’t know where he brought you?”

Aaron shook his head and wrote again. _Drugs._


	5. Chapter 5

As both the official and unofficial godparents of all BAU kids present and future, Garcia and Reid had discussed Jack and Reid agreed to take the boy after Christmas so the analyst could travel to Maine with Rossi and Prentiss. It was nice to at least get to spend time with the younger Hotchner, even if he would never get the affection he desired from the elder. He and JJ were going to accompany Morgan for his sit-down with Cruz and the Bureau brass to share what they knew so far about Hotch’s captivity and how the Bureau failed to find him sooner.

Garcia was nervous the short flight up and not her normal, chatty self. She hadn’t actually seen Hotch yet, but the way the others had described him made her heart hurt. And there was everything Jack had talked about regarding his dad being an agent, she knew at some point the older man needed to know.

“The doctor said his recovery is going well.” Rossi spoke up from the other side of Prentiss on the plane. “They don’t want to force his system too fast, they think he was only given a little bit of food once a day or so…” He exchanged a look with Prentiss. “Probably what we saw was what he got.”

“Do they have an idea of how much weight he’s lost?” She asked back.

“I gave them his weight from his last physical, the doctor thinks forty pounds at least. He is getting lots of fluids and is on a feeding tube with a continuous high-calorie pump. Slow and steady.”

==

The nurses station was quiet when the trio turned up, but Bernice recognized two of the three from earlier in the week. “Agents.” She smiled. “Aaron is sleeping a lot, and I don’t think he’s aware, but when he is awake, he spaces out for a bit and then picks up again like the gap in time never happened.”

Emily had a worried look on her face. “Any idea what causes it?”

“Could be the head injuries, the scans show he was beaten several times, or the malnutrition affecting his brain, or any number of things. He’s very quiet, even with his mouth wired together, usually patients figure out quickly that they can talk a bit, but…” She shook her head. “Obviously I don’t know him as well as you all do, perhaps what we need if for you to sit with him and then give us your opinions. Is his silence normal or worrying to you, that sort of thing?”

“Sure.” Dave nodded, turning to the other two. “Shall we?” He led them to Hotch’s room, stopping in the doorway to knock. “Aaron?”

Slowly, Hotch turned his head and looked right at them, but didn’t acknowledge them any further.

Strolling into the room, Rossi took the chair closest to the bed. “Garcia saw your message, but you knew she would. How are you holding up?” It was as if he wasn’t sure they were there, the way he was staring almost through them. “Aaron?”

Unable to hold herself back any longer, Garcia let out a sob, rushing forward to wrap him in a hug, hearing him gasp. “I’m sorry.” She whispered, thinking she hurt him.

He grunted and lifted his pencil. _Garcia. You’re really here._

She pulled back, confused.

His eyes tracked to Emily and Dave, this time really looking at them. _Dave, Prentiss. I wasn’t sure if_. He stopped writing.

“You weren’t sure of what, Aaron?” Dave asked.

_Kept dreaming of you, seeing you when you weren’t there._

“Hallucinating?”

Aaron nodded. His heart both soared to see them and sank slightly as he realized Reid wasn’t among them.

Dave sighed. “As soon as you are able to talk, we need to hear what happened.”

==

_Hotch had spent the drive trying to get some sort of rise out of the man behind the wheel, profiling him out loud, pressing his buttons, but the man simply ignored him. He did his best to leverage himself up to get his bearings, but the man slammed hard on the brakes, sending Aaron tumbling into the footwell of the back seat._

_When the Jeep stopped, it was in a deserted lot, they were parked off the road where anyone driving by wasn’t likely to see them. The man vanished for several minutes before Hotch heard another car starting up and getting closer. Crunching gravel and the chug of an old engine, filling the air with exhaust fumes, and then the door by his head was yanked open. Before Aaron could get his bearings, a hard object slammed down on his head, much larger and heavier than the gun from earlier. He fought the blackness for several minutes before pain and nausea forced him to give in._

_The next time Hotch woke up, he was wedged in a tight, dark space, his hands were now bound together behind his back and after an attempt to shift his position, he learned a rope of some sort had his feet pulled up and attached to his wrists. A gag was in his mouth, foul tasting material pressed painfully into the corners of his lips. Along the side of his face, he could feel dried blood, likely from the head injury from earlier. Wherever he was, there was no light source, no way of telling how long he’d been wherever he was now, just that it felt colder than when he’d last been awake._

_Scooting around the space, he tried to profile using his other senses, eventually working out that he was in a trunk. A trunk of a moving car. As the hours ticked on, Aaron tried not to let the constant hum of the car of the road lull him back to sleep._

_==_

_Hotch didn’t see daylight again, despite the stops the car had made, until his captor opened the trunk, blinding him with daylight. However long he’d been in the truck, the sun was high in the sky now._

_The man sneered, grabbing Hotch and hauling him out of the trunk, dropping him in the snow. Aaron tried to remember how far south or east had snow already, but it had already been a cold start for much of the country. Still tied, he grunted when the man started kicking him with what he suspected were steel toe boots, as tears from the pain welled up in his eyes. Another blow landed, and he couldn’t hold back anymore, hours of being trapped in the trunk mixed with the pain and his entire body spasmed, letting go of anything it had been holding._

_The captor reeled back, taken by surprise at the sudden foulness. Angered, he grabbed the rope binding hands and feet together and used it as a handle to drag Hotch across the rocky yard and shove him bodily down a set of stairs and into a cellar. As blackness overtook him, he managed to cry out only a single, soft word. “Spence!”_


	6. Chapter 6

Emily watched Hotch sleep. Whatever he was thinking about, it wasn’t pleasant, she wondered if it was about his time in captivity. Rossi and Garcia had eventually left to find some food and drinks and Emily had offered to stay put in case Hotch woke up again, she’d busied herself with straightening his extra blanket and topping up the pitcher with a small amount of water. She still couldn’t wrap her head around how thin and gaunt he was now, the toned muscle wasted away. With a huff, Emily reached out and took on hand, careful not to disturb the IV taped in place. “We can’t keep doing this you know, you take too many hits, need to let the rest of us cover for a while.” A squeeze of her hand stopped her talking, her eyes snapped up to watch his face as he slowly came around.

Hotch slowly searched out the source of the voice he’d woke to, finding Prentiss at his side. He really wished he could just tell her everything, tell them what he’d been through, but then he got the feeling they already knew. Glancing around the bed, he couldn’t see the paper anywhere and he frowned. Aaron really wanted to be able to communicate with her. He tugged her hand again.

Emily leaned in. “What’s wrong?”

He shook his head slightly, making a writing motion with his other hand, not wanting to lose the grounding her hand was giving him.

She looked around the room. “I don’t know where it went, I’m sorry.” She stood. “I can go ask for more.” Emily started to pull away.

Aaron held tight to her, forcing himself to speak. “Sss-tay.”

Emily was surprised by his painful sounding voice and promptly sat back down. “Okay. I won’t go anywhere.” She met his eyes. “I’ll stay right here until the other two get back.” She looked him over. “Do you need anything?”

He shook his head again.

“Is… does it hurt to talk?”

He drew in a ragged breath through his nostrils and slowly nodded.

“Did Jones do something?”

Another nod.

“I… I’m sorry.”

==

_The cellar was freezing, Aaron shivered hard against the cold. He was still tied up, but at some point, after dark, his captor had returned and cut away his clothes. The cellar had a pair of high, narrow windows just above ground level that helped him keep track of the passing of time. For three days, he stayed in the cold cellar, no food or water, unable to move around to relieve himself, and still gagged and bound._

_Overhead, Hotch could hear movement, a chair sliding across the floor here, the creak of a bed of the sound of running water there, and the backfire and rumble each time the car started._

_On the fourth day, the man thumped down the stairs and knelt over where Hotch lay. “Got all the fight out yet?” He cut the gag away, not caring that he cut some of Aaron’s cheek as well._

_Finally able to lick his parched lips, Aaron gasped. “Who are you?”_

_The grin was unsettling. “Guess you ain’t gonna be able to tell anyone anyways. Tom, Tommy to some. Tom Jones.”_

_“Why me?”_

_Jones shrugged one shoulder. “Why not? I saw you on TV pickin’ on some poor man who was just tryin’ to love someone. It’s not his fault there are silly rules about who you can love.”_

_His brows knit together, that didn’t narrow it down at all. “What are you going to do to me?”_

_That made Jones chuckle. “I always wanted a pet. You know, they tell ya that if you get a pet that will be allowed to run the property, first you gotta keep it penned up for a couple’a weeks so it understands what home is. Train it proper, make it respect you as the alpha the way it should. Then you can start lettin’ it out on a chain for a bit, let it smell the smells. You’s gonna be my new pet, but first I gotta be sure you won’t be makin’ no noise, causin’ no problems for me and the best way to do that is to break you.”_

_“Break me?”_

_Jones nodded. “And I’m gonna break you good.”_

_Aaron instinctively flinched as the man raised his fists, bringing them down repeatedly on his head. The pain was excruciating and in his weakened and bound state, Aaron couldn’t do anything to protect himself. He realized he’d never been able to really appreciate before just how strong, how resilient, Spencer was and had always been, even when he’d seemed so young. Spencer had endured abduction and torture, staring down the barrel of a gun at his own imminent death, without the years of emotional conditioning Aaron had. It added a fresh layer of reason why Aaron found himself infatuated with the younger man._

==

Tears pricked her eyes from the pain where Hotch was squeezing her hand, but she didn’t try to pull away. Whatever he’d been through, she knew they only barely knew the horrors of it so far. He was still deep into a memory when Rossi and Garcia reappeared, the older man only needing a second to take in the situation before he rushed to her side and tried to free her hand.

“What happened?” He hissed under his breath.

“I think he’s having a flashback.” Once her hand was free, they all turned as one when alarms started to sound on the monitor, bringing a wave of medical staff into the room, pushing them into a corner. “What’s happening?” Emily tried to ask.

“He’s seizing!” A nurse called out, followed by instructions from the doctors on medications to start.

Afraid, Penelope gripped Rossi’s arm, tears running down her cheeks. “Oh my god!” She couldn’t pull her eyes away from the convulsing body on the bed.

Unable to do anything else, Dave turned and pulled her to his chest, allowing her to hide her face in his shirt. He’d done some of his own digging into Jones since the capture and rescue and was confident that nothing the man had done had crossed into the sexual, but Jones had a well-documented violent streak.

==

_Aaron had sustained multiple beatings throughout the remainder of that day before being offered a small dish of water to lap from, not an efficient task for a human. As he’d leaned over it, drops of blood had tinged the water red as the room had spun. Momentarily revitalized from the water, Aaron had looked up at Jones and gave his best sneer. “My team is already hunting you down.” A steel toe boot swung forward hard, kicking him under the chin and throwing him backward across the cellar. With his arms and legs still tied, Aaron wasn’t able to catch himself as his head bounced off the cement floor. The boot was on him again before he could open his eyes, stomping his face repeatedly. The last thing Aaron remembered before blacking out again was the absolute excruciating pain as his jaw broke and pain flared above his ear._


	7. Chapter 7

Dave was alone in the room, he’s sent the girls, and he wasn’t afraid to call them that to their faces, to the hotel so Garcia could calm down. The seizure had been terrifying, for sure, the doctor had mentioned concern about pressure and bleeding, but it had ended fairly swiftly, and he knew that was a good sign.

The sight of Aaron’s body, stripped to the waist of his gown as they’d started working on him, had shaken Dave more than he’d expected, however. His best friend had been reduced to little more than skin and bone. It was heartbreaking. Dave wondered what else had left with it, his strength perhaps. The witnesses in town had reported Aaron had been unsteady on his feet, the assumption being he had sustained some for of stroke or, as Jones’ story had been, had always had some cognitive impairment.

Aaron was sleeping now, partially sedated. Dave kept watch, mentally promising never to look away.

==

_Based on Aaron’s best guess, his jaw had been broken nearly a week, which meant he’d been Jones’ captive, his pet, for close to two weeks. Almost every beating left him blacking out and water had been scarce, food even more so, but Aaron was pretty sure he hadn’t lost any whole days._

_All day, Aaron had been listening to Jones working in the yard. He was now allowed to be free in the cellar, sufficiently weakened by starvation and beatings. Aaron worked hard to stagger to his feet, swaying hard and falling twice before he was able to get close enough to the window to see outside. There was some sort of post in the yard, rusty and heavy looking. Jones was working around it, attaching something. He stretched to see the man working with a chain. A chain, Aaron sank to the ground. A chain like you would tie out a dog with. Jones had said he’d be tied out in the yard._

_When Jones finally clomped down the stairs, Aaron was huddled in a dark corner, doing his best not to be noticed. “C’mere little pet.” Jones grinned. “It’s getting dark, soon enough it will be time for you to go outside.”_

_Aaron leveled him a glare. “No.”_

_Jones snorted. “I even got you a gift.” Out of his back pocket he pulled a dirty leather collar with two heavy rings at the ends. “This ‘ere’s a special one.” Out of his other pocket, Jones pulled a heavy lock. “You can’t lose it.”_

_When the big man leaned in, Aaron did his best to fight him off, but hunger was making him weak. Muscle and bone screamed as Jones forced him into compliance and got the collar in place._

_Just as dusk was setting in, at gunpoint, Jones dragged Aaron on his hands and knees out to the post. “This will be your daily exercise and if you’re good, I’ll feed ya.” He chuckled. “Eventually.”_

_Freezing and in pain, Aaron simply glared as he walked back into the cabin. It was the first really good look Aaron got of the place, they were in the middle of the woods, he couldn’t see any sign of another cabin around, no smoke plumes, nothing. He was well and truly isolated. If Aaron was going to find his way out, he was going to have to get creative. The temperature began to drop, and Aaron huddled close to the pole, working out a plan to be rescued._

==

Garcia was sitting in the coffee shop of their hotel when Rossi finally wandered in. “Will he be okay?”

Rossi was momentarily startled but then joined her. “They’re doing rounds now, so I came back for a shower and a nap maybe.”

“Will he be okay?” She asked again.

Dave sighed. “I want to say yes. I want to say it’s Hotch and of course he’ll get through this and bounce back, but…”

Her face fell. “Yeah…”

“But he has all of us, and that will make a difference. We’ll make sure he can’t forget it this time.”

Garcia nodded. “I’m not planning on just handing over Jack right away, he shouldn’t be in a position where he feels like he needs to care for his dad. We’ll have to work out something when he comes home.”

“You’ll have to talk to Hotch about that one.”

“I know.” She finished her tea. “When can we go back and see him?”

“In about an hour.”


	8. Chapter 8

_It had been days of being moved from the cellar to the frozen yard and so far, he hadn’t been gifted with any more food. He needed Jones to believe he was compliant, so he’d give him some more freedom._

_Jones appeared in the yard in the darkness. “Hungry pet?”_

_Aaron looked up at him with his most submissive look and nodded, not uttering a sound._

_With a chuckle, Jones dropped a large bowl of slop to the ground, watching as Aaron devoured it as fast as he could before heading back to the cabin. “You’ll learn.” He uttered cryptically._

_Huddled against the pole, Aaron first relished the feeling of fullness in his belly, making him sleepy. But then, unaccustomed now to food, his gut began to cramp painfully. Writhing on the ground, Aaron tried to stretch and find a comfortable position, but his body wasn’t giving in. The pain radiated in what felt like every direction, a sick, sweaty feeling washing over him despite the frigid air. Groaning, Aaron tried to relax and allow the waves to wash over instead of fighting them, but it didn’t ease the pain. When stretching out only seemed to make him feel worse, he curled in on himself until he simply couldn’t hold onto his meal anymore._

_The spasms and pain carried on until darkness had fallen. Completely spent, Aaron tried to use the patches of snow to clean himself up before dragging his chain to the other half of his circle._

_In the darkness, the beam of a flashlight bounced around as Jones shuffled into the yard, spotting his pet asleep in the darkness. With a swift kick, he woke him up. “Learn ya’ lesson about wantin’ food?”_

_Aaron nodded silently, wincing where the boot impacted soft flesh._

_Yanking the chain, Jones dragged Aaron back to the cellar for the remainder of the night._

_==_

_Beatings resumed early the next morning, stomps landing hard to his already broken jaw, to the constant sharp pain in his head, to sensitive areas. Aaron started to wonder if he would die here before getting a chance at freedom. After an entire day of little sleep and suffering through the physical abuse, Aaron was mentally exhausted, his submission must have shown because Jones grabbed his chain and dragged him up to the cabin for the first time ever._

_In the darkness, Aaron was dressed in old jeans and several layers of shirts and sweaters to disguise his frail form._

_“We’s gonna go on a field trip tomorrow and you gonna be good.”_

==

Aaron woke to three sets of eyes watching him from around the room. Drawing a careful breath, he decided it was time to start working to get better. “Wh’n I g’o ho’me?” The eyeroll his question drew out of Prentiss, he figured, was worth it.

“Once you’re stable then _maybe_ we can get you back to Virginia.” She answered.

“But you won’t be alone.” Garcia added. “You need Jack and he needs you but you both need proper adult supervision for a while until you are back to one hundred and ten percent.”

Carefully, he arched a brow. “An’ who ‘s goin’ t’ do th’a’t?”

Her grin was blinding. “Why me, of course!”

He braced himself for the pain of her hug as she closed the distance quickly but was shocked when all he felt was the careful brush of a kiss at his hairline.

Dave tugged her back before she could give in to the urge he knew she was fighting. “That’s a long way away, Aaron. You had a major seizure, you’re malnourished, they just had to rebreak and wire your jaw which, in different circumstances, might be worthy of a few jokes. The docs said something about skull fractures and bruising, and that’s just the highlights. You surely know about the exposure, you admitted to hallucinating. You are not leaving the hospital until every necessary doctor signs off on it.” He held Aaron’s gaze until the younger man finally gave a slight nod, his eyes averting as he conceded. He rarely made a power play on his friend, couldn’t remember the last time it’d even happened, it wasn’t his style, he and Aaron considered one another equals no matter the years or titles, but in this… In this Dave was not going to give in.

“At nigh’ I th-though’ I saw you sav’in’ me.” His voice was soft.

“We did come, Aaron. We knew you needed us and we came.” Dave’s voice was even softer now as he sat on the bed, forgetting the two women were in the room. Dave leaned forward, carefully cupping the least injured side of Aaron’s neck, thumb grazing his cheek, as he took Aaron’s hand with the other. “You saw us coming because you know we would find you and bring you home.” He leaned in, wanting to make sure the other man really heard every word. “Your family would bring you home.”

==

_Aaron was huddled against the post in the cold. He’d only just barely licked at the mush that was his daily meal, the taste was unbearable and helped remind him of the memory of the last time he tried to eat. The trip into town, walking around upright and squinting against the sun, had given him a horrible headache and left him even more unsteady on his feet. Jones had had to hold onto him to keep him from falling frequently._

_“Aaron!” A voice called out from the tree line. “Aaron!”_

_He wearily looked up, unsure at first but the face in the darkness matched the voice. “Dave!” He tried to call back through his mangled mouth._

_The team was rushing toward him now, no one was looking at the cabin and that small fact made the hairs on his next stand up. Something was wrong, this wasn’t the way. Suddenly, shots rang out and as each member of his team reached the edge of his circle, they fell to the ground, blood pouring out. Aaron crawled quickly to the first body, Spencer’s, desperate to save them, to stop the bleeding. “No!” He cried. “No! NO!” They were all here, he looked around, the whole team died saving him. Backing away quickly, Aaron realized there were too many bodies. His throat closed up around a scream as he realized why, not only was Garcia among the dying, Jack was there as well._

_Aaron began to scream, and he couldn’t make the screaming stop until agonizing pain ripped through his skull. He pulled away from the pain, dragging himself away from the repeated impacts until the collar around his neck was choking him. Opening his eyes, Aaron realized that he was alone with Jones beating him. The bodies hadn’t been real._


	9. Chapter 9

Over two weeks, Aaron’s color and weight slowly looked a bit better. Between the IV’s and the constant, slow pump of nutrients into his stomach, his body started to adapt to processing food again. The doctors were still concerned with his seizures and were working to find a medicine to keep them at bay. Dave and the other two had gone back to Virginia after almost a week and Aaron focused as much as he could on cooperating with his medical team to get better. He tried to not grit his teeth as he forced himself through therapy, making wasted muscles hold him steady as he tried to walk the halls.

When the day came that Aaron was getting permission to fly back to Virginia and be under the care of local doctors, he was anxious. Garcia had made sure there were daily chats with Jack and everyone had texted his new phone with words of encouragement, but he couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen the rest of his team in person. Eventually, Morgan entered his room with Reid and JJ at his heels, the temporary team lead grinning wide.

“Man, look at you!” Morgan chuckled. “You look good.”

Mouth still wired shut, Aaron chose to just nod, glancing at where the other two were glancing around the room. He had quite a few things to take back now, compliments of all of them, and it had been slow going trying to pack up without any bags to speak of.

“When are you being discharged?” JJ turned to him.

Hotch reached for the pad of paper and jotted down what he knew she wanted to know.

Ever the one to be after the details, she read it over and met his eye. “I’ll go find your doctor and make sure you have everything you need between here and home then. Hey, Spence?”

“Yeah?”

“Maybe you could run to the store we passed and get a carry-on or something? He doesn’t have a way to get all this home.”

Reid nodded, catching the keys to the rental one handed when Morgan tossed them to him. Soon enough, the room was down to just Aaron and Morgan.

“How are you really?” Morgan asked softly once they were alone.

_Good_. Aaron wrote.

“Hey. It’s just me. You don’t have to worry about how you sound.” Morgan tugged the pencil out of his hand. “Baby Girl said you could talk well enough.”

Aaron huffed. “Th’ey say I’m gett’ng better, but wha-at if I don’ ever…”

After a beat, Morgan sat beside him. “I get it man, there’s a lot of unknowns here. But you’re still a part of our family, even if, and this is a big if now, even if you can’t come back to the team. But don’t worry about that right now, okay? You have months of recovery ahead of you. And Garcia had worked out a plan so that you never have to be alone.”

He arched a brow.

Derek chuckled. “You don’t know?” When the only response was a head shake, he stood and began to bring all Hotch’s belongings to the bed, sorting them into piles. “Just wait till you get home and see what she’s done.”

==

Much to Aaron’s chagrin, he was forbidden from exiting the hospital under his own power, he understood why of course, but it didn’t make him like it any more. Giving him a modicum of privacy, Morgan and Reid had busied with the bags in the trunk while JJ had kept steading hands on him as he transferred to the seat.

“It’s not a long drive to the airport and Garcia already arranged to have a wheelchair waiting on us and we can use it clear to the gate. The jetway should be short enough that you can make it on your own.” JJ spoke as she arranged him. “We’re also pre-boarding and she booked us all at the front.”

Hotch simply nodded in response. JJ had always been the one to keep them all on schedule, arranging and scheduling and planning six steps ahead so they were always covered, passing instructions on to their analyst as needed. “Thank you.” He said softly, earning a grin.

“We’ll have you home before you know it.”

==

Waiting in the airport, Spencer scanned over everything the doctor had printed out as far as care for Hotch. It included nutrition plans and suggestions, medications, and concerns.

“Anything I should know?” Morgan asked, settling into a chair beside him. JJ and Hotch were seated close to the desk, waiting.

“Not a whole lot. He is still experiencing occasional, small seizures, the doctor goes into detail about what they have observed and what they have used.”

Derek frowned. “Is flying going to give him a problem?”

“I wouldn’t think so.”

==

The flight and trip to the hospital on base was uneventful. To Aaron’s delight, Garcia was waiting in the lobby with Jack at her side.

“Dad!” The boy cried out, running to him. “You’re home!” Tears fell freely from more than one set of eyes. “Don’t ever leave me again!”

“I won’t, Buddy, I won’t.” Aaron held him close. “I’ll never leave you again.” He didn’t see his team exchanging worried looks.

After a few minutes, JJ and Garcia started herding the pair toward the desk. They had an appointment with the local doctors who were taking over Hotch’s care and they didn’t want to be checked in late. Hotch frowned at the prospect of being poked and prodded more, but with his entire team as well as his son sitting just outside the door, he knew he didn’t have an option but to cooperate.

By dinnertime, Aaron was walking back through the front door of his house, something he hadn’t done in roughly six weeks. The house looked exactly the same, not a thing out of place as he sank into the couch. A gentle hand on his shoulder had him drawing a breath. “’s good to be home.”

The hand squeezed. “It’s good to have you home. I’m thinking of getting GPS tracker chips and embedding them in the lot of you.”

Hotch attempted a snort.

“I wasn’t kidding.” But she grinned as she said it. “I’m ordering Jack and I Thai for dinner, I’m just not up to cooking tonight. I swear to you though, I’ve kept the eating out to a minimum.”

“Thank you, Garcia.” He patted the hand on his shoulder before it slowly pulled away. “I knew I could count on you.”

“What are friends for?” She vanished into the kitchen for a bit before returning and joining him on the sofa. “I know you’d rather talk to Rossi or…” She sighed. “I know I’m not the first choice, but I’m a good listener. Rossi and Morgan were saying that you hadn’t really talked yet about what happened? And that you’ll have to eventually to get cleared to return.” She held his gaze until he nodded the tiniest of bits. “Okay.” She looked around. “Well, I’m staying with you guys at night, but everyone else is on a rotation to stay during the day. I didn’t want you getting tired of me.”

“I could never get tired of you.”

She chuckled and blushed. “Aw, you’re just saying that to be nice.” She waved him off and stood as the bell rang.


	10. Chapter 10

Reid nervously let himself into the Hotchner home. He’d managed to put off taking his turn, swapping with someone else each time with a flimsy excuse until they all seemed to catch on.

“I thought you weren’t coming ever.” Spencer got as a greeting as he stepped in.

“I…” He blushed.

Aaron gave him a soft smile. “It’s okay.” He’d made great strides with talking with his mouth still wired, he just had to be patient. “I’m glad you turned up.”

Shuffling in, Reid looked his boss and friend over. The older man was still very thin, but he looked healthier, whatever he’d been taking as nutrition had definitely been helping, and his skin looked brighter. “You, ah, you look good. Better. You look a lot better.” His eyes wandered from Hotch’s now long hair and beard, down his body, hidden by clothes. “So… What do you want to do today?”

It was Hotch’s turn to look nervous. “I didn’t want to ask one of the girls, but… Would you be willing to help me cut my hair?”

“I…” Spencer thought quick. “Are you sure?”

He nodded. “I usually use clippers and do it myself but… My hands still shake and I’m afraid of messing it up.”

“Oh. Yeah, yeah I can do that.”

“Thee, uh, the clippers are up in the master bathroom.” Hotch gestured to the stairs. “Would you…?”

“Sure.” Reid darted up the stairs, carefully walking into the bedroom and then the bathroom. It was weird to be nosing through Hotch’s cabinets, but he was there with a purpose. Clipper case found, he headed back down and found the older man getting settled on a chair in the guest bathroom. “Found it.”

Aaron took the case and opened it up, attaching the correct color guard.

Flipping it on, Spencer asked. “Ready?”

==

After the careful haircut and an even more careful shave, Spencer had suggested that the easiest way to clean off all the little hairs left behind was a shower, that was until he learned that, given his instability on his feet still, Hotch required some supervision for such a task.

“It’s not a big deal, Reid.” Hotch started. “You mostly have to just sit here while I shower. You only need to get involved if I slip.”

“Oh. Okay.” He bobbed his head before widening his eyes as Aaron quickly stripped naked and carefully stepped into the tub. Fully naked and clean shaven now, Spencer couldn’t help but appreciate all the smooth planes and sharp angles Aaron now had and, to his mortification, his found the rest of his body jumping into agreement. “Maybe, ah, maybe I should just wait in the hall?”

Hotch had had his head under the spray when Reid had spoken but popped his head out from behind the curtain just as the younger man stood to leave, at the way Reid moved, Aaron’s eyes instinctively dipped down. “Yeah.” He exhaled in surprise. Once he was alone in the bathroom, Hotch tried to work out what else, besides himself, could have caused the slight tenting in the younger man’s pants.

Once Aaron was out of the shower and dry, he realized he had no clean clothes, so rubbing his freshly cut locks, he headed into the next room to find pajamas. “Spencer?” He called out carefully.

“Yeah, um…” Reid appeared in the bedroom doorway, startled with the casual way Aaron was standing naked in the bedroom.

“Why have you been avoiding coming here? The others have all been twice already.”

“Uh, no reason.” He twisted his hands together.

“Spencer?” He arched one brow, turning and walking toward him. “Don’t lie to me.”

The naked man was closing the space between them. “It- it was nothing, okay?” He swallowed hard when Aaron smirked but sighed in relief when, instead of pressing the issue, Aaron returned to getting dressed. Never would be too soon to admit his little crush and his dreams about life-affirming sex.

Later that night, once Garcia had sent Jack off to bed, Aaron waved her over to the couch. “Does Reid have a crush?”

The split second of wide-eyed speechlessness told him so much. “What makes you ask that?” She rushed out.

He ignored her question for the time being. “Does Spencer have a…crush, for the lack of a better word, on me?”

Garcia clamped her mouth shut and blushed.

“How long as he felt this way?” He knew she’d know, but all he got for an answer was a head shake, so he began to ponder out loud. “Let’s see, when did his behavior change…” He had to think hard. “After Haley died.”

Bright blue eyes looked anywhere in the room but at him.

“Before that? When I got divorced.” Still no reaction. He frowned the best he could. “Since he and I met.” He tried, shooting in the dark, but the nervous and almost panicked way she shot out of her seat, babbling about needing a drink had him up and chasing her into the kitchen. “That was before Jack was born!”

Garcia froze, he was blocking her only exit now. “Please don’t ask me anything else.”

He backed off, but the next day at physical therapy, Aaron had a plan and he hoped his therapist would be able to help him achieve it.

==

Spencer visited Aaron every time he was scheduled after that, but it was as if the awkward conversation had never occurred. Aaron never asked him about it or tried to outright flirt with him, though the older man seemed more comfortable standing or sitting in Spencer’s personal space, but he never actually reached out and touched him. He drove the other man to therapies, helped Jack with school work, generally just kept Aaron from going stir crazy, it was as if the moment was simply in his imagination.

Aaron figured that, over time, he could get Spencer used to having him close and, eventually, the younger man didn’t tense up when he did. Aaron could sit or stand right next to him and Spencer didn’t react at all. It was a tiny bit manipulative, but Aaron was slowly getting him conditioned to accept his presence.

The day came, several weeks after Aaron had returned to Virginia when he was finally scheduled to have the wires holding his mouth shut removed. He still had a long road of physical recovery to do, and plenty of weight left to gain, but the idea of being able to use his mouth properly again was a major step to him. The entire team had surprised him in the waiting room when he showed up with Morgan as an escort and Aaron was pleased to see Spencer was among them. It took time to be set free, but eventually Aaron was stretching his mouth out and making faces as the skin and muscles moved in ways they hadn’t in months.

Stepping back into the waiting room, he looked around at his team, his friends. “Thank you all for being here, helping me recover. I have a way to go before I’m back at work, but I wanted to be sure that you all knew how much I appreciated you not giving up on me in December and how much you’ve helped in my recovery. There is one other thing I want to get out in the open today.” He turned and took the few steps to Reid, before the younger man could react and panic, Aaron wrapped his arms around him, lifting his feet from the floor, and pressed an urgent kiss to Spencer’s lips.

Spencer froze for a moment before relenting to the tongue pressing for entrance and relaxing in Aaron’s arms. The room behind him filled with whoops and cheers and he blushed.

Out of breath, Aaron sat Spencer’s feet back on the floor and tucked his lips close to the younger man’s ear. “You could have told me.” He pressed a gentle kiss to warming flesh. “Once I’m fully recovered, I plan to do something else about it.” He stepped back, letting the others encircle them, filling the waiting room with laughter and chatter. “I’ve waited for you to notice me for just as long.”

Spencer’s blush deepened and, unable to find the words for a response, he simply pulled Aaron’s face down and kissed him again.

The sound of someone clearing their throat had both men’s heads turning as one to look at Rossi.

“I was thinking Jack should come to my place tonight for a rematch on my Xbox.”

“Uh, I…” Aaron’s eyes quickly scanned the room, taking in the suppressed grins on everyone’s faces. “Sure.” He chuckled when Jack whooped and jumped in the air. “You be good, Bud.”

“I will, Dad! You have fun with Spencer!” Jack called out, already dragging Dave to the door. Slowly, the rest of the team followed until it was just the pair remaining.

“I guess you’re my ride home then.” Aaron said softly.

Spencer’s blush was back. “Ready?”


	11. Chapter 11

The house was silent. They’d rode home from doctor’s office in silence and had eaten in silence. Eventually, Spencer sat right next to Aaron on the couch. “Who told you?”

“What?”

He ducked his head. “You said earlier, you’ve been waiting for me to notice you just as long… Who told you?”

“It wasn’t so much as they directly told me as it was that I can read them like a book.”

Spencer pondered that a moment. “Garcia then.” He chuckled at the surprise on Aaron’s face. “She’s the only one who can’t keep something from you.”

Aaron huffed. “Yes, Garcia.” He lifted his arm and pulled Spencer close. “I meant it though.”

“So, what do we do now?”

“Well. I’ve never really been attracted to a guy before and I’ve been accused of being a bit old fashioned in how I view dating.”

“You like to court a woman.” Spencer cut in.

He pondered on that a moment. “Yeah, I guess I do. I’ve been cleared as far physical activity; my injuries are all now healed.” He frowned. “I still don’t have any stamina though.”

“Stamina?” It was Spencer’s turn to arch a brow. “Exactly how far did you see this going tonight, Agent Hotchner? Were you planning an attempt to steal the pirates’ treasure?”

Aaron blushed a deep red as he ducked his head. “And if I said I was hopeful to…do that?”

Spencer laughed before turning in his seat, so he was facing the older man, bringing their lips very close together. “Going all shy on me now, are you? Come on, say it.” He gently coaxed. Lifting one leg, he moved to sit straddling Aaron’s lap, whispering. “If you say it, you just might get a prize.” He rolled his hips forward, bringing their groins together.

Aaron inhaled a hiss at the sudden flush of heat that headed south. “I…”

“Say it.” He whispered again, nipping at Aaron’s lip.

“I want to steal the pirates’ treasure.” He gasped when Spencer rocked forward again, putting pressure against his hardening cock. Lips overpowered his before he could speak further, bringing their bodies flush together until he finally had to break away to breathe. “Spence…”

Lips red and swollen, Spencer leaned back slightly, resting his hands on Aaron’s sides.

“I… I haven’t really talked to anyone yet about what happened and…I know I need to.”

“You gave your official statement.”

“Yeah, but…I know I need to _talk_ to someone about it.” He watched Spencer’s mind whirl. “Would you help me find someone familiar with trauma recovery?”

“Oh! Yeah, I mean, yes! Yes, of course!”

Aaron pulled him close again, wrapping him in a hug. “Tomorrow, we’ll deal with all of it tomorrow.” He rocked his hips up into the younger man. “I think maybe we should take this to my room.”

“Okay.” Spencer pulled back, offering his hands to help pull Aaron up. He bit back a groan at how tight Aaron’s pants were at the front, his mind happily superimposing the memory of Aaron’s prick. He led Aaron to the bedroom and stripped quickly before turning to watch as Aaron carefully followed suit.

Both naked, Aaron glanced nervously at the bed. “How do we…”

It was surreal to see Aaron unsure of what to do next, a part of Spencer had figured that even in this, he would be confident. “Sit on the edge of the bed.” He softly directed. When Aaron was seated, Spencer knelt between his knees. “Just do what feels good.” Finally, he allowed himself to stare properly at the dark cock standing proud before him. He took it in one hand, giving a preliminary stroke from base to tip which drew a breathy sigh out of the other man. Leaning in, Spencer took as much of Aaron’s length in his mouth, the girth requiring him to focus to not choke.

Aaron couldn’t believe how glorious the wet heat was. “Oh, Spence.” He moaned, threading the fingers of one hand through the younger man’s hair. As the head bobbed, he panted. “God, you’re so good.”

He carried on, increasing and decreasing the pace and pressure based on the sounds Aaron was making, wanting to make it last as long as it could. Finally, he pulled off, standing and guiding Aaron back as he climbed onto the bed beside him. “What do you want, Aaron?”

“I, I’m not…”

“Shh, it’s okay. You said stamina was still an issue, would you like to be ridden?”

He thought about that, thought about another man looming over top of him, but before he could answer, hands were on his cheeks and lips were pressed against his.

“No riding tonight.” His voice was soft, understanding. “C’mere.” Spencer pulled them chest to chest, amazed at how un-awkward it was that they were the same height and almost the same build. Single-handed, he pulled their cocks together and began to stroke, first slowly and then faster. “Look, Aaron. Look at us together.”

Aaron looked down between them at where their pricks were thrusting out and vanishing in Spencer’s hand. Drawn in, he added his hand over top, just going along for the ride on their cocks.

“You have the most beautiful cock I’ve ever seen.” Spencer whispered. With his free hand, he pulled him close, pressing his tongue into Aaron’s mouth to fuck him there as their joint pricks fucked up into his hand.

He couldn’t believe how overwhelmingly wonderful it felt, having his mouth fucked like this. Aaron felt a tremble begin in his body and he wrenched his lips way. “God, I’m gonna explode.”

“Good.” When Aaron’s head ducked down, Spencer moved his mouth to suck at his neck.

Between their bodies, Aaron watched with rapt fascination as the pooling heat in his belly pushed further south, drawing his balls up and then with a deep rumble, his prick was shooting streams of his seed between them. The stroking and sucking continued as Spencer shifted their hands, so Aaron was the one directly holding flesh. And then it was Spencer’s cock throbbing and pulsing in his hand and Aaron found it to be the hottest thing he’d ever experienced. He could feel the pulsing in Spencer’s dick as it had swelled. Curious, Aaron turned lose and felt lower, bringing their balls together to hold them, feel their weight, feel how they were still drawn up as the aftershocks twitched through them.

After what felt like hours, Spencer pulled back, blushing as he realized the size of the hickey he’d left. “Sorry about the mark.”

Aaron smirked, not really caring in the moment. “Sorry about your hand. And stomach. And…everything.”

He pressed another kiss to Aaron’s lips. “Never apologize for showing me how much you love me.”


End file.
